Which PDA phone?

[Cyric]

Hey guys I was looking for thoughts opinions on both the Sprint Handspring Treo 300 vs. the T-mobile Pocket PC Phone. Which would better overall. Any reviews? Thanks

later Cyric

[Tommy Boomfiger]

it really depends on what you need it for.

[bachviet]

Originally posted by Cyric
Hey guys I was looking for thoughts opinions on both the Sprint Handspring Treo 300 vs. the T-mobile Pocket PC Phone. Which would better overall. Any reviews? Thanks

later Cyric
If you live in California, don't even bother with T-Mobile. Verizon is the best here in SoCal (least drop calls and dead spots).

[hapoo]

Originally posted by bachviet

If you live in California, don't even bother with T-Mobile. Verizon is the best here in SoCal (least drop calls and dead spots).


I dunno, i just got tmobile last week and so far its been great! I've gotten reception everywhere i've gone, including places at&t and others haven't. :shrug:

[eSDee]

Originally posted by bachviet

If you live in California, don't even bother with T-Mobile. Verizon is the best here in SoCal (least drop calls and dead spots).

So are you recommending the Kyocera Smartphone?

[bachviet]

How about the Toshiba 2032 from Sprint?

[Tommy Boomfiger]

first off, you need to figure out what service you want. whether it is sprint, tmobile, verizon, etc. dont choose the service provider by the phone. i did that once and paid for it. keep in mind that sprint pda's are only single band, they wont roam so you will only get similar coverage as tmobile. some advance features from tmobile are only availible in thier "t zones". i dont know what t zones are, but i hear that you have to be in the t zone to do certain things. according to sprints disclaimer, certain features may not be available in all areas. do more research on that.

t mobile map:
http://www.t-mobile.com/images/maps/national_us/national_us.gif
notice all the pink are. this is where you can call from. according to the tmobile rep i spoke to yesterday, you can only make 911 calls from the yellow area.

sprintpcs map:
http://www1.sprintpcs.com/media/Assets/Maps/usmap_492f2.gif
the dark green area is sprints network. the light green areas are roaming. you cant see them, but dark grey areas are "planned sprint pcs networks" and the light grey area is not serviced. your phone wont work there. single mode phones will only work on the dark green areas.

after that you have to figure out which os you want. there are pros and cons to both palm os and ppc. ppc is more compatible with office documents and maybe other files as well. palm os requires 3rd party software to do such. but if all you want is for your address book, date book, short notes, and games palm os should be sufficient. ppc usually offers a more powerful processer which will basically let you play some better games and may work faster for some apps. palm has a much larger selection of apps and is a little easier to use IMHO. ppc users i talk to usually tell me that it doesnt take very long to get the hang of ppc.

hope this helps you all choose the right phone.

[Nottoman]

I just had a long conversation last night with a buddy of mine who owns a wireless company and handles all the major carriers. The new Pocket PC phone made by Siemens will have service through T-Mobile and AT&T here in the NW, and it will be through the GSM network, which is spotty for both carriers. AT&T's TDMA network on other wirless plans is quite good, but the phone won't use that. T mobile is worse. As mentioned before, he said Verizon is hands down the best. The Kyocera Smartphone is Palm based and there are Verizon phones for this model as well as Sprint. Correct info here as far as I know. I have a brand new Smartphone if anyone's interested.

[Tommy Boomfiger]

whenever someone asks my opinion of these smart phones, i tell them to consider a few things.
price. one smart phone will cost you upwards of $400, while a good cell phone can be found for under 100 and a good palm, not ppc, can be found under 300.
size: pda phones are pretty big. do you really want to carry that around with you everywhere? you can get a small phone with organizer functions (phone numbers, calendar, to do list and web browsing) and leave your pda behind when you dont want to carry it.
technology: when you want to upgrade one component, you will have to upgrade both. say you buy a pda phone and 6 months down the line there is a new pda with functions you really want. you would have to upgrade the phone and pda. not a big problem, but it does come back to cost.
IMO, most people dont need a pda phone and would be better off with separates, but it is nice to have an all in one unit so you dont have to carry 2 things around with you everywhere.

[eSDee]

Originally posted by Tommy Boomfiger
IMO, most people dont need a pda phone and would be better off with separates, but it is nice to have an all in one unit so you dont have to carry 2 things around with you everywhere.

That's the only reason I would want one, so that I don't have to carry my palm around with me everywhere I go. Plus having just one address book would be nice.